Something Inside
by Seirios
Summary: The long awaited chapter four now Up! All the signs point to the fourth wildpower being located in New york. Now the race is on to find them before the Millennium, and before anyone else, but does either side realise just how close they are?
1. Throbbing Canines

Disclaimer: i am far too stupid to make any of the nightworld up, however, all new characters you see are my own *beam*   
Now, this is my first proper fanfic and as yet im not entiely sure what's happening down the line (i have a vague idea but it has to be firmed up a bit) please r/r because i need the pointers!  
hope you like this first bit  
~*Seirios*~  
  
He watched her openly as she emerged from the bathroom, her honey blonde hair clinging in dark, wet tendrils to her pale skin. Her hazel gaze swung to meet his, perfectly aware of his eyes roving over her towel-clad body. smiling, she padded softly over to him, dripping gently onto the carpeted floor  
"Jasper?" she started softly, staring deep into his grey eyes with her Hazel ones. Such gentle tenderness rang through her voice, causing his mind and body both to stir.  
"Jasper..." she began again, her soft voice remaining smooth "if you don't stop perving on me, I'll rip your head off." She smiled radiantly at him, turned on her heel and swung shut the door to her bedroom.   
  
Jasper Redfern's grey eyes clouded with anger, now the brooding colour of heavy stormclouds. That damn girl! he sighed wistfully. He could still smell the delicate aroma of her. Ginger and ginseng shower gel, fruity traces of her shampoo, but underlying both, the scent of her warm body. His pupils dilated involuntarily, and his teeth began to tingle pleasantly at the thought of her warm, smooth skin and the network of veins threading it.  
  
She walked out of the small bedroom adjoining the common room "Stop it Jass, or I may have to throw you out" she said calmly, turning to face him, clad now in dark blue silk, hair still hanging damply across her shoulders. "Now what is so urgent that it can't wait?". she glanced towards Jasper, who was desperately trying to will his teeth down so he could talk.  
"Well... it's about the fourth wildpower" 


	2. Such Sweet Sorrow

Sebastian Oakborn was strolling along the New York streets authoritatively. He was being watched. Several 'inconspicuous' persons had been trailing him all the way from the corner of eleventh and fifth. He knew, of course, but he also knew he couldn't let on. Being watched was bad enough, but letting them know that you knew... that was practically asking for it. There were five of them tailing him at the moment, but he had noticed at least three switches so as not to alert him to their presence.  
  
'Yeah right' he thought, smothering a derisive snort. 'Like you could catch me out'. They were switching again, he could see them out of the corner of his eye. Vampires from the looks of them. He recognised the predatory gait, like they were stalking something.  
  
'You' A little voice inside him piped up helpfully.  
  
He turned into Washington Square Park, under the mini Arc de Triomphe, and was swallowed up by the leafy May trees. He continued to survey his watchers from his vantage point in a verdant maple. They were puzzled. He knew the risks of this strategy of course. If he was caught up the tree, they could hardly ignore the fact that their cover was blown, and that could certainly have side effects. Death for instance.  
  
They remained for a few minutes before spreading out to sweep the rest of the park. He waited, checking carefully the positions of the nine vampires he'd already seen, and scrutinising everyone else in the fear that there may be more nearby. He dropped silently from the tree and started sprinting.  
  
He was barely out of breath when he reached Mercer Street. Being superhuman sure was swell. He chuckled quietly, carefully over-looking the street and its occupants for possible enemies. He entered a nondescript brownstone house, typical of the area.   
  
"Oakborn!" came a voice from the end of the passage, bright and cheery despite the awful situation. The last Wildpower still had not been found and the millennium was ticking ever closer. But even in the hardest times, Saffron Heall was, still, gently beautiful. She had soft, sculpted features, bright amber eyes and wavy flame coloured hair midway down her back. She hugged him, hard.  
  
"What kept you? We thought you'd had a run in with a stick" She joked, her almost luminous eyes crinkling with mirth.  
  
"Saff, this is serious," he said, uncharacteristically grave. "I was tailed today. I lost them in Washington Park but they'll be back as soon as anyone spots me." Saffron's eyes had lost their twinkle. She looked searchingly into his sapphire blue eyes. The depth of her gaze made him think, just briefly, as if she could see right into his soul.  
  
"Nightworlders?" She asked, already knowing what the response would be.  
  
"Looks like it. I'm sorry Saff. But it looks like they only have their eyes on me at the moment, so I won't come here anymore. I can't risk... WE can't risk them finding this place." The unassuming brownstone was one of the most important locations Circle Daybreak owned, apart - of course - from the safehouses where the three Wildpowers were currently in hiding. All the main operations for finding and protecting the fourth Wildpower were based here, in New York City.  
  
"We'll set you up a place" She said resignedly. This eventuality had been planned for, but it was still heartbreaking when one of your main operatives had to be relocated. Until it was safe for both him and the others, he would be effectively renounced from Circle Daybreak.  
  
"All right" He sighed. It had to be done.  
  
"I'll miss you Oakborn. We all will."  
  
AN: thankyou to those who reviewed! (I now have a multi chapter fic! *dance dance*) 


	3. Standing Still

There we go... I apologise for any spelling errors, I know there's at least one... I think it was an 'apartment' Oh well.  
Thankyou tou shadow and Pmagik for reviewing and making me happy. Whimpers to anyone who reads this but does not review... pretty please?  
Enough rambling... Chapter three  
  
She stepped delicately out of the shower again. That was the trouble with living in vermin infested holes like New York, you had to take about four showers a day to feel vaguely clean. The stench of the humans clung to everything, clothes, hair, even skin. She snarled and went to get dressed again, she needed to see the council later, to discuss the developments brought to her attention earlier. They had recieved intelligence that the fourth wildpower was located somewhere in New York, and they were currently trailing Circle Daybreak members in case they got there first. The Daybreakers' New York headquarters still had not been discovered, but her team was working on infiltration. She finished dressing and walked out of the apartment. She passed countless numbers of vermin on her way to the council's meeting place. She scrutinised each one, picking out the faults that would always mean the Nightworld was superior to these pathetic rats. 'Bleach blonde straw for hair', she thought, passing a woman desperately trying to remain twenty something. 'Toupee', her brain fired, head turning rapidly to examine new specimens, 'too short', 'cellulite', 'diseased'.   
She sighed, content in her own perfection.  
  
Sebastian walked slowly along, contemplating the day's events. This morning he had been vaguely happy, apart from the worries about the millennium, which was only to be expected, but by not even 12 o'clock, Circle Daybreak had disavowed all knowledge of his existence, and he was moving halfway across the country. They couldn't get rid of him quick enough. He could understand it, but accepting it was a different matter altogether. So it was in a distinctly sour mood that he walked aimlessly along Greenwich Avenue.  
  
'Glasses', she thought. 'Too fat. She'd have no hope if she was chased'. At the thought of this, a spasm of hunger and longing spread through her body like wildfire, causing all the natural reactions present in a predator of her calibre. She swung her beautiful yet strangely savage face around to meet the next person in what was just a slipstream of food to her.  
She paused, puzzled. She faced a boy, about seventeen or eighteen, with alabaster skin. His eyes were an azure blue, like a cloudless summer sky captured in a bottle. His medium brown hair hung loosely, falling into his eyes as he gazed back at her, surprise staining his eyes a deeper, oceanic blue. His lanky, but exquisitely muscled body tensed, ready to turn and run at any moment.  
  
He could only stare at her, she was so beautiful. Her hazel eyes found and gripped his. Wisps of soft, blonde hair fluttered in the wind around her. With the sun shining through it, it looked like a golden halo. But anyone could see she was anything but an angel. Her delicate features, her soft brown eyes, cute button nose, and full, rose lips all held a disturbingly feral quality to them, like a kitten snarling. He was drawn irresistably to her, even though all the muscles in his body were screaming at him to run.  
  
He fascinated her, he was like nothing she had ever met before, he was a vampire, which in itself was nothing new. But he held an inner power which was distinctly different from anyone she had ever encountered. She knew one thing though, she wouldn't give him to the council, he was hers now, and she wanted to play. They were drifting slowly closer together, in a few more seconds they would be close enough to touch. His body was still tensed, and he looked as though he was having an internal struggle of great proportions. One of the multitudes of humans passing them bumped carelessly into her, breaking the spell. She glanced angrily at the man. When she looked back, Sebastian was gone.  
  
Sebastian was running full pelt along the rooftops, jumping gaps at speed which no ordinary person could. He needed to be far away. The whole experience, while only taking a minute or so in real time, had shaken him thoroughly. The memory of her face seemed to be etched into his brain, her peaches and cream skin, honey blonde hair, hazel eyes and even, pearly white teeth. That damn girl! He came to a rooftop on West Eleventh Street and stopped. He gripped the precipice of the roof and swung himself down from the roof through an open window. Saffron had warded it so nobody but him could enter the apartment unless invited. Her wry sense of humour regarding his race never failed to amuse him. He glanced around his barely furnished aparment, everything was as it was this morning. But the movement caused his head to swim and he was starting to get dizzy. In all that had happened today he hadn't fed yet. He needed oxygen, he needed blood. Grey spots were starting to flood his vision. He staggered towards the door, and collapsed. 


	4. Beneath Me

Having realised that my poor Sebby had been unconcious for about five months, i thought I'd better get writing again. The break was unfortunately for my A levels *groan* but from now on i shall endeavour to keep things running a little more quickly. Thankyou to P Magick and Shadow, my only faithful reviewers *sob* lol and a special thanks to P again for helping me sort my plot out a bit (yes, that's right! it now has a plot!)  
  
enough rambling. I dont own anything of the night world blah blah  
  
~*Beneath Me*~  
  
Saffron found him later that afternoon. He was supposed to call on the secure line to pick up details of the relocation, and when no call came, Saffron was sent to investigate. She opened his apartment door and stuck her head round.   
  
"Oakborn?" she called, getting increasingly worried at the lack of response from the apartment. "It's me, Saffr..." her words were cut short by a sharp intake of breath as she spotted his form flat out on the living room floor. She crossed the room in three strides, knelt beside his supine body and propped his head on her lap. His normally pale skin was almost translucent. With a absently worried frown she retrieved her silver penknife from her pocket and, wincing slightly, made an incision in her index finger. A bright bead of blood welled on her fingertip almost immediately and she lowered it to his lips, letting her blood flow slowly but steadily past his pale lips. After a moment, what little colour usually resided in his cheeks returned, and long, dark lashes fluttered slightly on his cheek.  
  
The room swam slowly back into focus for him. He sat up and glanced about the room, taking in his dishevelled state, Saffron's finger and their position on the floor with surprise. He tentatively licked coppery residue from his lips, as if confirming a suspicion, and looked away from the girl kneeling next to him.  
  
"It's alright you know" Saffron said, matter of factly. "I think you needed it more than I did" She smiled slightly and laughter began to creep into her voice, partly to relieve some of the obvious guilt on the young man's face, and partly due the simple fact that it amused her. The vampires of Circle Daybreak, while socialising freely with the humans which had once been their mortal enemy, all seemed distinctly guilty for the fact that they needed to drink the lifeblood of creatures to survive. They still didn't seem to understand that the Daybreakers accepted the fact along with the shifters... ah... tendencies.  
  
Sebastian looked at Saffron from underneath his fringe still without a smile on his face to match hers. While his fringe wasn't exactly a brilliant cover for looking at people, it afforded a certain amount of detachment and served as a convenient wall to shield himself with. Saff was beautiful alright... soft, laughing amber eyes, a spattering of freckles across her nose and a cascade of reddish-auburn curls which he knew would feel like silk if he stroked them. Her small, delicate form remained kneeling on his dusty floorboards. With her petite stature and posture she looked like an elf, or a pixie or something... he started to smile as his thoughts conjured up images of her sitting on toadstools and wearing flower petals. No, he thought, Saffron Heall was definitely not a pixie.   
  
His head gave an unyielding sort of spin, as if to remind him why he collapsed in the first place, and it didn't seem to be going away anytime soon.  
  
"I... er... I should" He began, all traces of a smile disappearing as he stood up and dusted off his faded jeans in an ever-so-slightly wobbly gesture. Saffron understood. All Daybreak vampires were supplied with blood, the kind hospitals used. The blood they got was not suitable for medical use due to various infections and diseases, but the vampires were impervious to such ailments and could quite happily use it to feed from.   
  
She waited in the living room while he fed. Again, vampires tended to be a bit skittish about their feeding in front of others. She walked inquisitively around the sparsely furnished room. She had been here before, but only on flying visits, and while it may claim its share of cats, curiosity had not yet got the better of Saffron Heall. The room before her had an unpolished wood floor, clean white walls, and natural colour sofa, It was just an ordinary apartment except for the fact that it seemed to have almost no personal touches, or items that would indicate an occupant. Saffron poked her head out into the hall, satisfied that there was nothing of interest in the living room. A small kitchen adjoined the hallway, opposite the door to a bedroom. Sebastian was in the kitchen with the door shut. to her left, the bedroom door was slightly ajar, giving a tantalising glimpse of colour, and the prospect of a room which may finally satisfy her curiosity. She glanced back again at the kitchen door, which showed no signs of its occupant emerging soon. The petite redhead walked slowly forward, reaching out her fingertips towards the door before her. Still without touching the wood, she peered round the doorframe. A bed was in plain view, with what seemed to be cream silk sheets, but the door snapped shut before she had a chance to see anything else.  
  
"Saff, how many times do we have to do this before you realise you're not getting in that room?" asked Sebastian's calm, slightly sarcastic tones from close to her left ear. Saff grinned. Caught again. She glanced down at his slim, pale hand on the doorknob and turned to face him, rolling her eyes jokingly.  
  
"Yeah, yeah, curiosity killed the cat, I know." She leaned back against the door and smiled gently at him. Her small, delicately tapered hand reached up to rub the back of her neck, as if ridding herself of a crick. She tilted her head back slightly, exposing the pale skin of her throat and let her hand fall back down, stroking enticingly over her neck before it came to reside in the small of her back, palms pressed to the door.  
  
Sebastian's gaze dropped to the floorboards, and he withdrew his hand from the handle as if he'd been burned, taking half a step backwards. He hated the way Saffron could be manipulative as easily as she could be just plain nice. And he hated the way that she could get the better of him so simply when everyone else wouldn't dare to contest him. It made him feel powerless in the worst way.  
  
Saffron's amber eyes widened and her smile fell away as she stepped towards him. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to... I," her eyes dropped to join his on the floor.   
  
Sebastian nodded. She never realised she was doing something like that, it didn't mean anything.   
  
"Forget it Saff." he said, his eyes lifting once again to her face "Why did you come to see me anyway?"  
  
She glanced at him, and saw his blue eyes clouded and shut off, like a stormy ocean, unyielding and secretive. She still felt half guilty. She used herself, her body, to get what she wanted, to her it was little more than a useful tool for that end. It had been that way since she stopped being the skinny redheaded kid in the corner and blossomed into something people called beautiful. But she never usually did that with people that mattered, but Oakborn seemed to be the exception to the rule.  
  
"You didn't call. The circle was worried, so I had to investigate a bit." she smiled half heartedly at him.   
  
He nodded, remembering his imminent relocation. Fan-bloody-tastic. "I'll call them in a bit, I have to start packing."  
  
Saffron nodded. "I'll leave you to it then." she took a step towards the front door and stopped. She looked back at the vampire, who hadn't moved, and walked back to him. She smiled at him and threw her arms around his chest in a surprisingly strong hug for someone so small. He froze, half indignant, half plain shocked. He tried not to scowl at the liberty she took and patted Saffron gingerly on the back. She was without question the most bewildering thing he'd come across.   
  
"Goodbye Oakborn," she mumbled into his chest. "Don't forget us."  
  
"How could anyone forget you? You're all insane."   
  
She tried to scowl at him, but it was still half a smile.   
  
She pulled away from him and walked to the door. She pulled it open and was about to walk through it.  
  
"Saffron..." Sebastian began, taking a step towards her, he stopped and cleared his throat uncomfortably, staring at the floor for about the hundredth time this visit. "Thankyou." She smiled at him and nodded before walking out of his apartment and closing the door behind her.  
  
Sebastian sighed and crossed the hallway to the front door.  
  
"How could I forget you?" He laid his forehead on the wood and proceeded to brain himself with the help of a two and a half inch thick oak door. He quickly desisted when he found how much more the room seemed to spin than normal. He staggered to the bedroom door and threw it open, making a beeline for his bed. He collapsed onto it and closed his eyes against the whirling of his ceiling. Sebastian simply lay for a moment, grumbling about 'bloody females' and letting his mind wander to the girl who had been just under the surface of his thoughts since he'd met her. He opened one eye tentatively to find the ceiling had contented itself with a gentle sort of rocking. He sat up and reached for the phone.  
  
He was to take the 10.45 train tomorrow morning from Christopher Street, when he reached West 72nd he would meet with a Daybreak contact. The contact would give him further directions to his new home. His belongings would be sent over separately. Operatives would see to the packing and removal tomorrow at midday.  
  
He glanced around at his bedroom and stood up, fetching a box from under his bed. He had some packing of his own to do before the circle got their hands on his flat.  
  
~*~  
  
A scowl was threatening the girl's delicate features as the council meeting wore on. She was trying to concentrate on the voice from the front of the room and avoid the wrath of any council members. Jasper kept shooting her warning looks and she stopped herself from drumming her fingers impatiently on the table for the seventeenth time that hour. She snarled silently at him and compromised by doodling aimlessly in the notebook she had been given, but all the formless shapes she scribbled seemed to evolve into his face, the boy from the street.  
  
A slim, tapered hand slammed down next to her notepad with deceptive force.  
  
"Pay attention girl!"   
  
She looked up and hastily suppressed the impulse to tear his throat out, after all, Achryanthes Oleander was a vampire not to be messed with even by her standards. There was bitter malice glinting in eyes so dark you couldn't tell where iris ended and pupil began. His white-blond hair was falling into his eyes, creating a striking contrast. She managed to look contrite despite the seething rage that bubbled just beneath the surface of her demeanour. He bent down and leaned in close to her, so close that she could smell the faint coppery-sweet scent of blood and fear from his last meal. He spoke to her, a whisper soft enough for only her ears, but a whisper saturated with menace   
  
"Don't forget your place here girl, you are nothing to us, you are beneath contempt. Don't ever forget that."  
  
She clenched her fists under the table and bowed her head. "No, Sir. I won't Sir," she murmured, in a voice tinged with just the right amount of penitence. She concentrated on the sensation of her nails sinking into her own flesh as she squeezed her fists tighter.  
  
Oleander narrowed his eyes at her suspiciously and straightened up.  
  
"All of you may leave." His black suited figure spun on its heel and pushed through the door at the head of the room before anyone else had even stood up from their seats. She stood, ripped the page of doodles out of the notebook and tucked it into a pocket before kicking open the second door in the space and storming out. All the council members bar Jasper pretended not to be looking at her, while Jasper himself followed her closely. She slammed the door shut behind her with the result of a muffled cry from the lamia. Jasper pushed the door open again and caught up to her in three strides, holding his nose and blinking his watering grey eyes.  
  
"I tried to warn you," he said with a tinge of bitterness, wiggling the cartilage of his nose tentatively as they walked down the corridor to the lifts. She rolled her eyes and made silent 'blah blah' motions with her mouth in front of him where he couldn't see. "He was in a foul temper and you kept making bored noises and were quite clearly not paying attention." he continued. They reached the end of the corridor and entered a lift. The doors slid shut with a 'ping' and the lift juddered into motion.  
  
Jasper folded his arms across his chest and pouted at her. "If you'd listened to me in the first place you wouldn't have got him angry,"  
  
She whirled on him with a roar, and all the rage that had simmered inside her boiled over in an instant. She grabbed him by the throat and pushed him up against the wall, his feet treading thin air. She leaned close and practically spat the words at him, "Shut up. I wasn't paying attention because nothing has changed. We still haven't found the last Wildpower. We don't even know if the Daybreakers have found them yet. Our intelligence is below sub-standard and all efforts to infiltrate their organisation have so far failed. And that bastard Oleander keeps telling me I'm scum because of what I am." all through her speech she had punctuated her words with small shakes of the vampire. She knew the insult she was paying him. No vampire could possibly submit to this kind of treatment. She tensed herself for his retaliation. None came. She frowned, come to think of it, the most he had done through her entire speech was squirm to test how tightly she was holding him. She studied him closely before dropping him in disgust. Her treatment of him hadn't insulted and angered him at all, in fact he had quite enjoyed it. He looked up from where he had fallen to his knees, and pushed dirty blonde hair out of grey eyes so dilated there was hardly any grey left. He gave her a lecherous grin, she gave him a kick in the nuts.  
  
The lift doors slid open for the ground floor and she strode out and across the lobby of the building. She pushed through the doors of the front entrance where two vampire guards stood. They looked away as she passed.  
  
~*~ 


End file.
